The Following 2.3: Coalescing

The Following finally got down to brass tacks in 2.3 tonight - meaning it finally set all of the pieces in dangerous motion, stripping away a main mask, and reestablishing relationships on both sides of the good and evil divide that animates the series.

On the unmasking: I was a little suspicious of Lily from the beginning, because she did she manage to survive that subway attack.  And my wife pointed out that that's the way the Followers work - get Ryan to start falling in love with, or at least liking, someone, as a way of getting to him and getting him to drop his guard.  (See my review of last week's episode.) And that's just what Lily did.

Great acting from Kevin Bacon as Ryan gives Lily a look after he's figured her out, and the best chase scene I've seen in a while on television as Ryan goes after her on foot - unsuccessfully but he gave her a good run for his money.  Of course, Ryan's not paid as yet, and everything he's been doing  has been fueled by his justified obsession about Joe.

But Mike and Ryan are finally beginning to work on the same side, and that's good to see.  Although the episode ended tonight with Ryan on the outside, he and Mike are least mostly on the same page, and that's the only chance the good guys have to get Joe.   But for that to happen, Mike has to be convinced that Joe is still alive.

Joe's of course very much alive down South, and the way he extricates himself from that situation was not only one fine sick piece of work in itself, but important to the plot by giving Joe a new follower, someone he could wind up closer to than any of the followers up in New York, including Emma.

She's now with the gang who did the subway attack, and they know - as Ryan now does too - how Joe escaped alive from the last scenes of last year's season.   This ties up another dangling end, and provides another testament to Joe's genius.

So the pieces are in motion and The Following's set to bust out all over.  Bring it on.

See also The Following Is Back for Its Second Season ... The Following 1.2: Rediscovering Oneself

And see also The Following Begins ... The Following 1.2: Joe, Poe, and the Plan ... The Following 1.3: Bug in the Sun ... The Following 1.4: Off the Leash ... The Following 1.5:  The Lawyer and the Swap ... The Following 1.7: At Large ... The Following 1.9: All in a Name, Or, Metaphor in the Service of Murder ... The Following 1.13: At Last Something of a Day for the Good Guys ... The Following Season 1 Finale: Doing Dead

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